TSA agents stop Star Wars actor over 'lightsaber'

TSA agents in Denver held up Peter Mayhew, the Star Wars actor who played Chewbacca, for traveling with a large, ‘suspicious’-looking cane that resembles a light saber.

The 69-year-old actor stands 7’3” tall and relies on his walking
cane to get around, which is designed to look like a light
saber. But when ‘Chewbacca’ reached security at Denver
International Airport on June 3, his famous role in Star Wars did
little to smoothen the process.

Mayhew was returning to his home in Boyd, Texas, after attending
the Denver Comic Con. He frequently brings his light sabre cane
to public events, and has posed in numerous photos with the
object over the years.

Transportation Security Administration agents stopped the man and
initially refused to allow the walking cane onboard. Mayhew
live-tweeted the incident, documenting his frustration with his
followers while the agents were examining his light saber-like
cane.

The Force was strong in Chewy’s case: Mayhew posted numerous
photos of the incident on his Twitter account, and claims that
TSA agents allowed him to take the cane onboard only after the
online uproar began. One photo shows the enormous actor sitting
in a wheelchair while TSA agents examine the walking stick.

“Magic words to TSA are not ‘please’ or ‘thank you’ … It’s
‘Twitter’… cane released to go home,” Mayhew tweeted from his
account, @TheWookieeRoars, indicating that the agents buckled to
pressure from tweets about the incident.

“In Dallas. Thank you to @AmericanAir for checking up on me.
Problem was all @TSA. I’m a million-miler on American and they
are a class act,” he later wrote.

But the TSA soon released its own statement, arguing that their
agents were not swayed by the angry tweets against them.

“Because of the unusual weight of the passenger’s cane, a
security officer alerted a supervisor,” reads the statement,
which was sent to AP. “Less than five minutes later the
passenger and cane were cleared to travel. Social media played no
role in the determination.”

The actor, who is frequently referred to as “Chewy”, also
retweeted an astronomer who quoted Star Wars’ Han Solo in the
context of the TSA incident.